


an excellent handler

by Prim_the_Amazing



Series: marvelous wolves [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Role Reversal, Assets & Handlers, Bucky Barnes as Captain America, M/M, Psychic Wolves, Steve Rogers as the Winter Soldier
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-07
Updated: 2020-04-07
Packaged: 2021-03-01 16:35:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23530159
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Prim_the_Amazing/pseuds/Prim_the_Amazing
Summary: Bucky introduces Steve to the rest of the team.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Series: marvelous wolves [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1693294
Comments: 35
Kudos: 199
Collections: Fandom Trumps Hate 2020





	an excellent handler

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ZepysGirl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ZepysGirl/gifts).



Bucky can’t just keep Steve inside of his apartment for the rest of time. It’s strangely tempting to try it anyways. He’d be  _ safe, _ at least, and maybe if he just gives Steve enough time to simply relax he might eventually accept the fact that Bucky isn’t his fucking _ handler, _ holy shit, where the hell did he get that idea from. 

But he knows deep down that if he tries it, Steve’s gonna completely lose his mind pretty soon and do something _ drastic. _ This would’ve been true for the Steve who’d never stepped a foot out of Brooklyn back in the 1920s as well. It’s just that now he and his wolf have enough weight and stamina to do some pretty devastating damage in the process. Also, knives. Steve’s got a  _ lot _ of knives now. 

So he very, very reluctantly admits to some people that Steve may, in fact, still be alive, and he may even know of his location, and it could perhaps, theoretically, possibly be in his apartment. 

It doesn’t go…  _ super _ smoothly. 

“Cute pet killer you’ve got there,” Tony says with his usual tact and tasteful diplomacy, which is a fantastic and telling start to the meeting. He’s looking over his shades at Steve who’s standing at parade rest before the table everyone’s sitting at, instead of taking the seat that Bucky deliberately left open for him right next to his own, Marigold sitting with stiff perfection at his feet. Tony’s expression is very pointedly casually apathetic, in a way that he probably doesn’t intend to come off as supremely douchey. “He’s got all of his shots and everything?” 

Maybe Bucky should be grateful for the fact that Tony’s calmed down enough from the whole ‘the Winter Soldier assassinated my parents’ thing to not immediately open fire on him. This is practically reasonable, coming from Tony. 

Bucky is not grateful. This may or may not be because the implication of him being Steve’s _ owner _ hits a bit too close to home right now, not that Tony would have any reason to know about that whole quietly simmering shitstorm. That he’s still procrastinating on dealing with, because how the  _ fuck _ is he supposed to deal with that. 

“Don’t be a bitch, Tony,” he says perhaps a bit too sharply, because Steve’s just  _ standing _ there, cold blue eyes on Tony, otherwise not reacting at all to being insulted to his face in a way he never would have before. 

He put the mask on before they left the apartment. Bucky hadn’t tried to stop him. He’s very deliberately not telling Steve to not do things that he does of his own initiative, which is definitely a change from their old dynamic. 

He’d nag and bitch and scold with exasperation and worry, and Steve would defend himself with his ridiculous reasoning and then proceed to do what he thought was right no matter how much Bucky argued that it was a bad idea that would get him hurt. The problem now is that Steve will probably actually _ listen _ to him if he says no. He’d be angry and resentful about it, but he’d do it. Bucky had never thought he’d see the day when Steve would 1. Do as he was told, and 2. It would make Bucky feel queasy with guilt and other bad feelings. 

He feels like the mask definitely isn’t helping this interaction, though. It sort of… dehumanizes him. 

Which is most likely the point of it, now that he thinks about it. 

_ Calm,  _ Barker thinks.  _ Don’t growl at Tony just because you’re worried for Steve. Things won’t be better if it turns into a fight.  _

When she says Tony’s name it smells like machine oil and stupidly pricy cologne inside his mind, and when she says Steve he gets the scent of their old place back in Brooklyn, his paints and that subtle but unmistakable sick smell that pervaded his bedroom over half of the time. The smell of his childhood. 

“Just joking around, Cap,” Tony says, unsmiling and unblinking, meeting Steve’s gaze with steady unflinching stubbornness. Bucky imagines that if Tony had a wolf, the thing wouldn’t be hiding their barely leashed animosity any better than Tony is now. But he doesn’t, because Tony (loudly, repeatedly, whenever the topic even vaguely comes up) claims wolves are  _ out of fashion _ and  _ unscientific _ and  _ just get in the way. _ He has a different idiotic explanation each time for why he doesn’t have one. Bucky doesn’t know why he can’t just say that he simply doesn’t want one. It doesn’t need to be more complicated than that. 

“This is going very well so far,” Natasha says dryly. Looking at it in a very, very generous light, she may even be right. No one’s dead yet, or have even pulled out their weapon. Although more than a couple of people definitely oh so casually have their hands on them. “Mimosa’s, anyone? I’m gonna have a mimosa.” 

“Ooh, get me an americano?” Tony says, still not breaking eye contact with Steve, facial expression still too serious, too intent. It’s a bit disconcerting, hearing that light voice come out of his mouth when he’s looking that grim. 

“I said does anyone want  _ mimosas.  _ Because I’m already making myself a mimosa. I’m not a barista, Tony.” 

“I’ll have a mimosa, thank you,” Clint says. He’s one of the ones with his hands casually on his weapon, fiddling with his bow in his lap like he just needs something to occupy his hands with. Lucky is casually resting in a pose that would coincidentally let the dog-wolf spring into action in a moment's notice. 

“No, thank you,” says Bruce. 

“I’ll have one too,” Bucky says, purely so he’ll have something to do with his hands besides white knuckle them in his lap beneath the table. Fidgeting his shield would probably come off as a bit too threatening, considering that everyone present has seen him behead people with it. The urge to get between the rest of the Avengers and Steve is overwhelming, and absolutely ridiculous. They’re his  _ friends, _ they’re not gonna hurt him or anything. He thinks. They’re just… tense. Wary. Which, fair enough. That’s reasonable, as much as he doesn’t like it. 

Thor isn’t here, which Bucky can’t decide is for the best or not. 

Steve does not elect to ask for a mimosa. 

Natasha walks off towards the bar, her wolf, Nikita, following her daintily, his ears and tails held in positions to broadcast very clearly to the rest of the room that he’s feeling perfectly calm and confident. Bucky appreciates it, even as he doesn’t think for a moment that it’s real. Natasha and Nikita wouldn’t be the greatest spies in the world if they let their guard down that easily while in the same room as someone with Steve’s… history. It’s nice to have someone who isn’t escalating the situation around, anyways. 

Although that’s mostly Tony so far, to be fair. 

“... Seriously, though, is he gonna go off the handle or something because he looks kinda feral,” says Clint. 

Never fucking mind. 

_ “Clint,” _ he says. 

“What?” Clint asks defensively. “He  _ does. _ I mean, I guess he’s kinda making it work for him, but still.” 

“It’s, um,” says Bruce, and Bucky realizes that he was so busy glaring holes into Clint for a moment that he somehow didn’t notice Bruce approaching Steve. He’s holding his hand out, as if for a  _ handshake. _ “It’s nice to finally meet you. I’m Bruce Banner, Bucky’s teammate.” 

Steve looks down at Bruce’s hand for a moment. And then he looks at Bucky. Bucky’s giving him a nod before he even realizes what’s happening. 

Steve takes Bruce’s hand and shakes it once. Marigold leans forward and just as perfunctorily exchanges greetings with Becca, sniffing her and letting herself be sniffed in turn. 

Becca’s relatively young, for the wolf companion of someone as old as Bruce. He hadn’t had one before the whole mess that turned him into the Hulk, apparently. He’d sought out a wolf with a calm disposition and courted her in the hopes that it’d help him keep his temper, her thoughts soothing him back down to earth whenever his anger would flare. It hadn’t exactly worked out like that, but at least she’d turned out to be pretty good at herding the Hulk away from civilians, like a very brave and specialized sheepdog. 

Bruce gives Steve a smile that’s a bit awkward, but perfectly nice, and Becca gives a tentative wag of her tail. Steve and Marigold go back to flawless parade rest. 

“You absolute madman,” Tony says. 

“Oh, shut up,” says Bruce. 

“Do it again while I’m taking a picture, let me get my phone.” 

“I’m sitting back down.” 

“You never let me have my fun, Brucie.” 

“Mimosas,” Natasha announces, entering the room. She slides one on the table towards Clint, who takes his hands off his bow to receive it. He does not put his hands back on his weapon. Lucky’s body language isn’t so obviously artificially relaxed any longer, and now he mostly just looks curious about the new human and wolf in the room, like he wants to go over and greet them. Clint sets a foot down on the wolf, lightly keeping him where he is as he sips at his drink. 

Natasha passes Bucky, giving him his drink as she goes. He takes a deep drink, even as everyone around him slowly relax just a bit as Steve continues to not go on a murderspree. 

Steve had looked to him for permission before shaking Bruce’s hand. The drink tastes sour in his mouth, and Barker presses up close against his legs. 

After the stilted introductions between Steve and the rest of the Avengers and some conversation that Steve and Marigold one hundred percent refrain from partaking in, Bucky decides to quit while they’re ahead and drag Steve home before something shitty happens. It’s not that Steve or Marigold are ticking timebombs. It’s just that he doesn’t quite know all of their triggers yet, or how violently they react when those triggers are set off. And in a room full of people like the Avengers, one violent overreaction could escalate very quickly and very badly. 

He remembers, vividly, the way Marigold had gone for Barker’s throat when she tried to mind speak to her without Bucky asking for permission for them first. Which is a pretty rude and stupid thing to do, never mind the fact that Bucky and Steve and their wolves were mind speaking to each other like it was the most natural thing in the world back when Marigold was just the sickly runt of her litter and Bucky hadn’t even gotten his first job yet. None of the Avengers were reckless enough to do something like that. 

… Especially since Thor hadn’t been able to attend. He loves the guy, really, but alien gods are apparently kind of chaotic, who knew? 

So, Bucky makes his excuses and goes to leave the party early. They’re all probably gonna start talking about them the second that they leave, but he doesn’t mind. Natasha’s all about second chances, Bruce doesn’t want any conflict, Clint’s just cautious and wary, and Tony _ is _ trying. He thinks. They can gossip and argue all they like. He’s pretty sure that the end result is still gonna be ‘we’ll give him a chance’. And Steve, after a lifetime of being denied any opportunities, will grab at any that are handed to him and run ten miles with it. It’s going to be okay, he tells himself. 

_ It’s going to be okay,  _ Barker tells him. It sounds slightly more believable, coming from her, which he appreciates. 

Steve and Marigold march at his side, in perfect lockstep. Bucky looks at them from his peripheral vision, unnerved. They look as stiff as they had the first time they showed up unannounced in his apartment. He hadn’t even noticed them slowly thawing, but the difference is very stark now that they’ve left the safety of his apartment to brave the big wide world full of people that aren’t them. He doesn’t like it. They seem more like the Winter Soldier and the Hunter than they do Steve and Marigold. He can see why Clint was uneasy, as much as he doesn’t want to. 

Is being out in the open what’s making them regress back to that? Will they relax once they get back home, or are Bucky and Barker going to have to start over again with them, the progress slow and painstaking? He’ll do it if he has to, but he really hopes that he doesn’t have to. 

He feels Barker reach tentatively out towards her telepathic bond with Marigold, and he doesn’t stop her. It may very well be a mistake to do that when Steve and Marigold look that tense, but it just makes him desperately want to touch base with them, to check in, to see if there’s anything he can do to reassure. 

Marigold does not lift her lip and snarl as Barker’s mind contacts hers. She doesn’t even reject it, softly or harshly. She lets them in easily, without protest or reluctance, or any outwards reaction at all, actually. Which is a bit strange and worrying on its own. 

_ Everything okay? _ Barker pushes at Marigold, with the underlying impressions of lurking predators looming nearby, just out of sight and waiting to pounce, along with a restrained burst of inquiry and concern. 

_ Operation going smoothly, _ Marigold replies. There are no attached concepts or memories or feelings included in that simple and short little message. It’s eerie. It takes a  _ lot _ of self control to send along an utterly clinical message that reveals nothing more than the speaker wants to, when it comes to mind speaking. Especially for wolves. Self control that Bucky had certainly never known  _ Marigold _ to have before. 

But she’s different now, of course. It’s been a long time, and a lot has happened to her since he last saw her. It’s only natural that she’s changed. It’s not like she’s unrecognizable-- Marigold’s always had a temper, and felt strongly about things. It just hadn’t been quite as deadly, back then, and she’d worn her feelings openly, without even thinking about hiding or controlling them. 

It’s just unpleasant, thinking about the things that must’ve happened to her to make her learn that iron fisted self control. And worrying, now that he can’t see how she or Steve are feeling, even when they’re connected like this. 

_ Operation? _ Barker asks him, after casually detaching from Marigold so she won’t hear them talking about her, presumably. Before, all four of them had been connected near constantly, whenever they were close enough for it. Now they’re disconnected more often than not. 

Bucky’s happy that Steve and Marigold have decided that they’re open to mind speaking with them at all. It’s okay if isn’t always, like it used to be. Whatever they’re comfortable with. 

That  _ was _ slightly odd phrasing, now that Barker points it out. Well, Steve and Marigold are far more… taciturn, than they used to be. This might just be more of that. Changed speech patterns, odd turns of phrase. 

_ Probably not important, _ he says to her. 

After they make their way out of Stark Tower, but before they can hail a cab, a sharply dressed woman that looks vaguely familiar steps up to them. Her hands aren’t holding a weapon, and Bucky would say that her suit is too form fitting for her to have any weapons hidden underneath her clothes, but meeting and getting to know Natasha Romanoff has been a truly eye opening experience. 

He gives her the charming Captain American smile, Barker casually striking a Lady Liberty pose in a way that’ll distract from the fact that she’s also positioned in a way that’ll let her quickly lunge at the woman if it comes to it. 

Marigold and Steve look far less like they’re not ready to throw themselves into a fight if the woman so much as twitches the wrong way. It may be the tac gear and weapons they’re both covered in. Not to mention the matching muzzles. Off to the side, someone snaps a pic, and Bucky’s not sure if it’s of the strangely dressed intimidating man and his absurdly large wolf, or Captain American and Lady Liberty out of uniform. Either way, no one sends them more than a second glance. God bless New York. 

“Hello, Captain Barnes, Sergeant Rogers,” she says, and her voice and Barker catching her scent finally makes her click in his memories. He relaxes, gives Steve a quick reassuring smile that he hopes sends the message that he doesn’t have to wait for a fight to break out in the next five seconds. 

Steve and Marigold don’t relax. Well, at least they don’t lunge at the woman, so he supposes that’s fine. 

“Hi, Abbey,” he says warmly, like he’d recognized her straight away. “Fury wants a meeting with us?” 

The man himself had finally deemed that it was about time that he declassified the fact that he was even alive a few days ago, having judged that the immediate threat of HYDRA to himself was acceptably in control enough for him to allow that risk. Standing before him is the woman that he vaguely recognizes as Nick Fury’s assistant. 

“He does, yes. Please step into the car.” 

This could, of course, be a trap. Anything ultimately can be. But Barker can smell her familiar scent, so she isn’t at least a HYDRA agent wearing one of those masks. And he can only assume that as Nick Fury’s assistant, she’s one of the most thoroughly vetted human beings in existence. She’s a familiar face, letting them into Fury’s office for a debrief or standing at his shoulder in the background for years now. 

It’s a calculated risk, but in the end he doesn’t hesitate to follow her to the shiny black car that she leads them to. Steve and Marigold follow them without hesitation as well, even though they don’t have nearly as much reassuring context as Bucky and Barker do. Bucky can only hope that it’s more out of trust than obedience. 

Barker reaches back out to Marigold again. Marigold accepts her reach without biting or rejection, again. Barker pushes the face and voice of Nick Fury at her through the bond, the feelings of  _ superior I respect, that I trust to have the right priorities. _ There’s not the feelings of safety and camaraderie that he has with the Avengers, or affection and devotion that he has for Steve, but he hopes it’s good enough. To inform him, if not reassure him. 

_ Understood,  _ Marigold and Steve say in a chorus, with zero underlying thoughts or feelings attached to the word. It’s still pretty eerie, but he and Barker don’t let that on. They just get into the car. Steve and Marigold follow them. 

The windows tint until they can’t see out of them any longer, and the car takes dizzying and labyrinthian twists and turns. So Fury’s exact location is still apparently a need to know sort of secret, even if the fact that he’s still alive isn’t. Good to know, he supposes. When they get out of the car, he can’t figure out their location from the skyline, because they’re parked underground. They were only driving for less than an hour, though, so it’s probably still New York. 

Steve and Marigold flank Bucky and Barker, one step behind them and to the left, like bodyguards. It’s one of those hundreds of small habits that they’ve picked up in the time when they were seperated, something so trivial that it really isn’t worth calling attention to it and making a fuss. There are more important things to handle first, like how Steve still thinks he’s his  _ handler, _ because he seems to have sorted the world into Enemies, Bystanders, and Handlers, and that last one is apparently the role that fits Bucky the best, in Steve’s mind. 

There’s still a brief moment when he misses the times when they’d walk side by side keenly, their hands casually brushing up against each other, Barker nosing at Steve’s hip, Marigold hitting Bucky’s leg with her wagging tail. He considers, for a second, just ordering them to walk next to them, instead of just behind. 

But he’s trying to let Steve take his own initiative, let him do things that he wasn’t told to do. And ordering him around seriously isn’t going to help Bucky’s case that he isn’t Steve’s handler. 

Abbey leads them down, down, past thick metal doors that need long pin numbers or voice confirmation or ocular scans or fingerprints. 

_ Smells sterile, _ Barker complains in his head, the scents she’s smelling much more keenly than him rising up in his mind. The sharp toxic smell of bleach, cleaning products, the dead stale recycled underground air. He bites back a grimace, sending her a vague pulse of sympathy, there there, just grit your teeth through it for a bit longer. 

Eventually, they stop at a door that Abbey politely knocks at before entering, which is how Bucky knows that it’s Fury’s office. He also notes that the knock has a sort of unnatural timing to it. Probably a ‘HYDRA isn’t holding a gun to my head, it’s me Abbey with no uninvited guests’ knock. 

“Come in,” Fury calls out, and they do. 

The office is spartan, no fun little office toys or pictures or candy dishes cluttering up the desk. Bucky assumes that they must be hidden inside the drawers. Fury looks just as alive and grim as the last time he saw him, if not more so. His wolf, named Wolf, although Bucky’s pretty sure that Fury just thinks its funny to keep his wolf brother’s real name classified, is seated by the desk, old and graying and scarred up to hell with one prosthetic leg, but still staring them all down with the confidence of a an animal used to being the undisputed alpha in the room. 

“Afternoon,” Bucky says, friendly. Barker reaches politely out to Wolf with her mind as usual, and Wolf rejects her firmly but gently, just like always. It doesn’t even hurt, the way he does it. Marigold had been pretty… _ strong, _ in her rejection, and there’s a certain vulnerability inherent to being the one who reaches out first. Luckily there wasn’t any permanent damage, and Barker’s all recovered now. 

Bucky tries not to be too obvious about scoping out through his peripheral vision how Steve is reacting to being in an enclosed, unfamiliar space with a man and a wolf that he doesn’t know that clearly have extensive past combat experience. 

He looks just as tensely stone faced and straight backed as he has for this entire outing. 

“This isn’t a press release,” Fury says, unimpressed. “Let’s cut the bullshit, Barnes.” 

_ I like him,  _ the Hunter says into Steve’s mind to him and him alone. He can’t help but grudgingly agree. He’s clearly one of those bosses that actually focuses on the work, instead of wasting time with frills and polite politics. The man quietly radiates confidence, and as does his wolf, despite the fact that they’re both old enough that Steve and the Hunter could almost certainly take them down before he manages to raise the alarm. Especially if Bucky and Barker take their side, which Steve isn’t sure that he’ll do, but he’s pretty sure that the man seated at the desk in front of him isn’t certain of that either. 

Not that it’s really a  _ good _ thing that the man is obviously confident. Bucky had made it clear to him how important this superior is, his mental image of him woven through with respect. 

This is clearly some sort of interview, to see how Bucky’s dealing with Steve, if Steve’s behaving. And normally Steve would relish an opportunity like this to casually make his handler look very, very bad. But for once, he actually wants for this sort of meeting to go well. He wants for Bucky to stay as his handler. He wants to make him look good. 

“One word of greeting is bullshit now?” Bucky asks, sounding far too personable and amused in contrast to Fury’s whole general demeanor. But his superior doesn’t snap at him for it, so it must be an established and accepted dynamic between the two of them. And the Hunter, her senses fine and detailed even for a wolf, can smell a hint of wariness on him. He’s not taking the situation lightly, despite his light words that want to make the listener think otherwise. That’s good. 

“Stark uses up my quota of tolerated meaningless chatter. The rest of you are gonna have to actually be straight with me.” 

“You’ve talked to Tony already?” 

“No, I’m still recovering from our last conversation six months ago. Bullshit. You’re still speaking it.” He gestures brusquely at Steve and the Hunter, who stand neatly, flawlessly at attention. He wants for this meeting to go well. “We’re here to talk about the HYDRA elephant in the room.” 

“He’s not HYDRA,” Bucky rushes to say. “Not anymore. Not that he ever was, he worked for them against his--” 

“I’ve read the highlights, just like everyone else and their granny. Downloading all of the intel straight to the internet-- whose bright idea was that? Yours, Wilson, or Romanoff?” 

“Mine,” he says. 

“So, definitely not yours, then,” Fury says dryly. 

Bucky gives Fury a charming smile. Fury narrows his one eye at him, annoyed, but doesn’t do anything worse. Bucky’s clearly favored by him to some degree, to get away with this amount of insolence in his office. That’s promising. 

And then Fury turns his heavy gaze on Steve, scrutinizing. “Well? Do you talk, or is that muzzle welded onto your face?” 

Steve carefully doesn’t startle. He isn’t used to being  _ addressed _ like this, so much as talked about like he isn’t standing three feet away. The handler is the one who handles him, and everyone else arranges things with the handler. Bucky himself seems to be holding his breath now, Barker not quite managing to pull off looking calm and relaxed. 

_ It’s a test, _ the Hunter supplies immediately, sharp and on guard. 

Obviously. The parameters and rules aren’t neatly handed to them, of course. All Steve can do is try and convey the right image, the right idea of what his behavior is and how Bucky’s handling him with his words and actions. 

Steve promptly takes his muzzle off, to start. Holds it one hand to his side, doesn’t reach up to rub the familiar soreness out of his jaw. 

“That makes this simpler,” Fury says. “So, do you agree with Barnes? You’re not HYDRA?” 

“I’m not HYDRA,” he repeats simply. The right answer was pretty obvious there. Even if he didn’t already know that HYDRA and SHIELD are enemies -despite how many of the former are members of the latter- he’d still be able to pick up on it from context clues derived from only this meeting. 

“Good,” he says lowly. His wolf is steadily eyeing the Hunter in a way that makes her want to snarl at him, but the muzzle helps push that instinct down. “And are you gonna decide to fulfill your mission one night and knife your boy in his bed?” 

“No,” he says, another easy question easily answered. It’s even true. This is the most honest he’s ever been during one of these meetings, he thinks, although he’s only going off a vague feeling. His memory isn’t exactly crystal clear. 

“And are you gonna be a good boy, or are you gonna snap?” 

Oh, Steve likes him. Refreshingly straightforward bastard. 

“Fury--” Bucky says, in tones of protest, but Steve neatly cuts him off. Interrupting his handler in front of his superior may be a bad look, but not answering a question said superior asks is probably a worse one. 

“Of course I’ll be good,” he says matter of factly. “Captain Barnes is an excellent handler.” 

Bucky’s mouth clicks shut, and there’s a long pregnant pause as Fury raises an eyebrow, and then slowly turns a look onto Bucky. 

“I--” Bucky tries. 

“I’m happy to hear it,” Fury says, a small but undeniable smirk tugging at one corner of his mouth. Pleased, Steve guesses. That’s good. He thinks this meeting might actually be going well, as intended. 

He wonders why Bucky looks so  _ uncomfortable, _ though. 

“Well, so long as Barnes has you so well  _ handled,  _ then I don’t see why I’ve gotta keep giving you two the third degree. You’re dismissed.” 

Steve doesn’t hesitate to follow the order, because you’re never supposed to hesitate on following orders, especially from men as clearly important as Fury. The Hunter barely restrains herself from rushing ahead of him, to get out of his claustrophobic office faster, out of this too familiar smelling underground, sterile place that reeks of cleaning products and dead air. Not pleasant, to say the least. But they’ve gone through plenty of unpleasant things in the name of accomplishing an objective, and they’re almost done with this one. They behaved well in front of Bucky’s team, his superior, and now they just need to get out of here before something goes wrong-- 

“And Barnes,” Fury says, and Steve goes tense and turns to see that Bucky hesitated, is several steps behind him. Not exactly proper. “Keep it up,” he says sternly, intently. 

Bucky is blank faced for one long moment, but then he smiles, his teeth white and straight, the one Steve knows best from interviews on TVs. “Sure thing,” he says. 

Fury rolls his eye and sighs, but waves them off. 

They go. Fucking _ finally.  _

Bucky bites down on his tongue in Fury’s office, and he bites it when Abbey walks them back to the car, and he bites it as they’re driven in a serpentine, disorienting way to his (theirs, his and Steve’s and their wolves) apartment. There’s a jumble of feelings and thoughts inside of him clogging up his head and his chest, eager to spill out messily everywhere even though they’re not even slightly organized or even all that comprehensible. Most of them are  _ no. _

It doesn’t help the way Barker keeps radiating unhappy anxiety at him. 

An excellent handler. Of course I’ll be  _ good,  _ Captain Barnes is an excellent handler. I’ll be good. So long as Barnes has you so well  _ handled. _ An  _ excellent _ handler. 

He grinds his teeth before he makes his tongue bleed. Digs his hand roughly into Barker’s fur, scratches at it reassuringly to help her bite back the whine that’s lurking at the back of her throat, wanting to creep its way out to where it can be heard by everyone. 

The car stops, and Abbey appears to open the door for them with her trademark professional smile. “Have a nice day, Captain Barnes, Sergeant Rogers,” she says brightly. 

“Thanks, you too,” Bucky says, mostly on autopilot. Steve says nothing, getting out of the car after him. He and Marigold scan their surroundings, their heads and eyes moving in smooth and practiced tandem so that they’re both covering different angles. Steve’s muzzle is back on, matching with Marigold. 

“Come on, guys,” he says, wanting to get back home already. This day’s been fucking nerve wracking, and he just wants to take a shower and eat and maybe scream into his pillow a bit while Barker lays on top of him, a warm and heavy reassuring weight. 

Steve follows after him. Obeys orders. Bucky bites his tongue again. 

He doesn’t want to be an excellent handler. He wants to be Steve’s best pal again. He wants-- 

He can’t just unwind time until they’re back again to where they used to be, as much as he may or may not want it. They’re both different now. They can’t go back to how they used to be. Even if things get better, it’s going to be different. 

Knowing that doesn’t stop him from desperately wanting to take Steve’s face in his hands and kiss his stupid mouth and  _ know _ that he isn’t moving away because he’s exactly where he wants to be. It’s driving him fucking  _ batty. _

They finally reach their apartment. Bucky locks the door behind him. Steve and Marigold start sweeping the place, synchronized, first quickly looking for any lurking attackers waiting to ambush them, and then more thoroughly for bugs or other fun surprises that someone may have hidden away while they were gone. Not that strange behavior, honestly. Bucky and Barker should probably join them, in fact, but he’s very tired all of a sudden. 

“Thai for dinner?” he asks, even though the buzzer going off from the delivery guy arriving always makes Marigold shoot up like she just heard a gunshot. He’d just like for one thing to be easy today, is all, and it might as well be dinner. 

“I want pizza,” Steve says, peering at the underside of their couch as he casually lifts it up. He’s taken off his muzzle while Bucky wasn’t looking at him. 

Bucky pauses. Looks at Steve and Marigold. They’re both dutifully searching the apartment, but… 

The tenseness they’ve carried around with them for the entire day is finally gone. Melted off as soon as they got home.  _ And _ Steve just disagreed with him and asked for something else, he’s pretty sure. 

Barker, who had been as ready as him to just spend the rest of the day regrouping before trying to tackle this problem, reaches out to Marigold. She accepts her easily. 

The bond is usually Bucky-Barker-Marigold-Steve, a straight line that doesn’t connect at every point. They don’t want to overwhelm Marigold or Steve. But now, Bucky reaches out as well along with Barker. Steve looks away from his searching and looks at him curiously, but accepts him after a moment as well. They’re all drawn into the link now, a closed circle of four. It feels so achingly familiar that it makes his chest hurt. 

Steve looks at Bucky’s chest, brow furrowed. “Are you injured?” 

Bucky huffs a laugh. “No-- no, don’t worry. Stevie, I just want to check something with you, alright?” 

As he speaks with his mouth, he lets his mind be open with it. So that Steve and Marigold and Barker can all feel the feelings that go with his words, flashes of concepts and associations and thought. He’s not getting anything from Steve or Marigold, but that’s fine, that’s to be expected by now. He doesn’t know what exactly they’re getting from him, he feels like such a mess, but whatever it is, it’s the truth. 

Steve frowns. Marigold makes a faint, distressed growl, muffled by her muzzle. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. I think. Just… you know that,” _ I’m not your handler. _ Except, he  _ knows _ that Steve does think of him as his handler. People have three categories in his mind: Enemies, Bystanders, and Handlers. Handlers can sometimes be enemies, enemies can sometimes be what are ostensibly his allies, bystanders can sometimes be victims… but at the end of the day, Steve is different now, the way he thinks is different, and Bucky knows that making Steve think of him in a way that doesn’t fit into any of his world view would be a fucking paradigm shift. And those aren’t exactly done quickly or easily. 

And he’s tired, and Steve is looking at him impatiently, so instead of trying to convince Steve that Bucky isn’t his handler, he says, “You know that you can disobey my orders whenever you want to, right?” 

Steve looks at him like he’s an idiot. “Yes,” he says. “You’re terrible at your job.” 

Bucky, crouched down on the floor with Steve, buries his face into one of his knees and kind of just cackles dementedly for a while. Barker is sparking off dawning, relieved realization in the bond. Marigold asks Steve if their handlers are losing their minds. Steve replies that it’s clearly already happened. 

“Oh my god,” Bucky says, feeling a bit like a fool for panicking all day about it. “You only act like a perfect obedient asset when we’re around other people. You’re just trying to make me look good.” 

_ Trying to protect me.  _

Oh, that one definitely slipped through into the bond. There had been a time when Steve and Bucky hadn’t hidden any of their thoughts from each other, completely comfortable with being fully seen by the other. Now, it’s a tiny bit embarrassing. 

Steve tilts his head like a confused puppy, his expression flat and unimpressed, like Bucky’s a particularly slow student. “Obviously,” he says, in a tone that might as well have been saying  _ duh.  _

Bucky laughs, and then he takes Steve’s face in his hands and kisses him. 

Steve doesn’t move away. 


End file.
